Reflection:

…humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.
~ Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), French mathematician and writer

Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm; but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
~ T.S. Eliot

We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency and to overthrow our patterns of thought and behavior.
~John R.W. Stott (1921-2011), noted English clergyman and theologian

How much larger your life would be, if your self could become smaller in it.
~ G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936), English writer and journalist

Reflection:

How much larger your life would be, if your self could become smaller in it.
~ G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936), English writer and journalist

It is better to be hurt by the truth than to be comforted with a lie.
~ Khaled Hosseini, Afghan-born novelist and physician

…we must come back to our first principles. And the most basic of these is the fact that God is there and that he is objective to us. He is not there to conform to us; we must conform to him. He summons us from outside of ourselves to know him. We do not go inside of ourselves to find him. We are summoned to know him only on his terms. He is not known on our terms. This summons is heard in and through his Word. It is not heard through our intuitions.
~ David F. Wells, author and theologian

While religious dogmatism is always a danger…. we’ve got more to fear from the easygoing narcissism that is so much part of the atmosphere nobody even thinks to protest or get angry about it.
~ David Brooks, New York Times commentator

The complete August 15^th bulletin is here.